Archive for May, 2016

For this post, I am featuring another open garden I visited in spring last year. Joyces Park is one of the Gardens of the Hedge (Horticultural Endeavours Demonstrating Gardening Enthusiasm) which were open for viewing from October, the 31st to November, the 8th 2015.

Joyces Park is a working farm. Farming implements and other bits and pieces gathered over the generations have found their way into the garden.

Tough, hardy plants which are drought and frost tolerant are a feature of this garden.

There were beautiful blooms to enjoy.

I liked the humorous touches. Perhaps a stray Yeti had wandered into the garden.

It was a pleasure to experience Glen-Olney where the colours of flowers and fruit glowed in the grey. Except for the owner’s friendly dogs, I pretty much had the garden to myself during the time I was there.

A new sculpture has taken up residence in Chewton. The life size timber carving sits perched on the front fence of American born artist, Richard Yates. The sculpture represents Mrs. Frances White who had a lucky escape in 1948 when part of the backyard of her home caved in. Mrs. White saved herself from falling by grabbing hold of a tree branch as the earth slipped away to reveal an old gold mine shaft 8 feet wide and 80 feet deep. Mrs White lived at 153 Main Rd. in what was formerly the Francis Ormond Mine manager’s house.

The old mine manager’s house

On the other side of the road is an earlier sculpture created by Richard Yates.

“Their shining Eldorado

Beneath the southern skies

Was day and night for ever

Before their eager eyes.

The brooding bush, awakened,

Was stirred in wild unrest,

And all the year a human stream

Went pouring to the West.”

“The azure line of ridges,

The bush of darkest green,

The little homes of calico

That dotted all the scene.”

“I hear the fall of timber

From distant flats and fells,

The pealing of the anvils

As clear as little bells,

The rattle of the cradle,

The clack of windlass-boles,

The flutter of the crimson flags

Above the golden holes.”

‘The Roaring Days’

by Henry Lawson 1889

If you want to know more about Richard Yates, the sculptor, check out this YouTube video:

Malmsbury Botanic Gardens are often a welcome stop for Katie and I on our travels to and from Melbourne. We like to spend time in the Pinetum at the end of the gardens near the viaduct. Recently, I visited Malmsbury to make this charcoal drawing of the pine trees. I like the textures of the bark and the shapes of the trunks.

Malmsbury Botanic Gardens, established in 1863, are one of Victoria’s earliest regional botanic gardens. Its main features are an ornamental lake and mature trees, mainly exotics.

A Pinetum is a plantation of pine trees or other conifers planted for scientific or ornamental purposes.